Out of Africa

Radu Mihaileanu’s Live and Become, from a screenplay by Mr. Mihaileanu and Alain-Michel Blanc, develops the consequences of 1985’s Operation Moses, which entailed the massive airlift of thousands of Falasha—Ethiopian Jewish refugees—fleeing persecution in their native country and seeking peace and security in Israel. The story centers on a Christian boy who replaces a Jewish boy who’s died on the eve of the trip, with the consent of that boy’s mother. Indeed, the film is as much about the mothers who nurture the homeless, parentless Ethiopian children as about the children themselves. As this one Christian interloper matures into manhood, his struggle to forge a new identity provides a stirring and uplifting tale of racial and religious assimilation.